Did you know that the Hero of Time Winds almost shot laser beams out of his eyes?

For real. It's true. When making The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker for the GameCube, Team Nintendo had to figure out a way to use the iconic hero's newly-cartoony eyes, and one possibility came up quickly: laser beams.

Takizawa: Now that the eyes had gotten much larger, we wanted to make their facial expressions richer by increasing the number of patterns for the eyes and mouth. Partway through, we even talked about having beams come out of those eyes! (laughs)

Iwata: Huh? Eye-beams?!

Takizawa: (Shigeru) Miyamoto-san and (Takashi) Tezuka-san said we needed to supply a reason for the eyes being so big. I don’t think beams were really an option, though.

Such a shame. Maybe they'll bring the idea back one day. For Wind Waker, they eventually decided to use Link's eyeballs as clues for puzzles and dungeons—if you pay attention, you'll notice Link staring at whatever you need to see or do next.

Nintendo's regular Iwata Asks interviews are usually pretty good, but today's, in honor of the upcoming Wii U remake of Wind Waker (out September 20 digitally and October 4 in stores), might be the best yet. Go read the whole thing.